perjantai 20. syyskuuta 2013

Northern Darkness Records Advance - Promo 1996


Various Artists - Northern Darkness Records advance-promo (1996)
1) Godfuck 93 - Tomb Desecration XXX 192
2) Godfuck 93 - 172: Whore Remix (Heroin Control)
3) Entirety - Intro
4) Entirety - Monolith
5) Entirety - Deserts of Vast Eternity
6) Handful Of Hate - Prophecy of a New Assiah's Supremacy
7) Handful Of Hate - Undicies Ah-Qlipha
8) Love History - Intro - From Bohemia's Woods and Fields
9) Love History - Labyrinth of Love
10) Love History - Desires
11) Novgorod - Through the Seven Gates of Kur
12) Novgorod - From the Flesh He Was Created

Depositfiles / Mediafire

Looks like it's been a bit over year since I last posted a compilation tape, time to remedy that I suppose. This item here is actually probably more correctly called a sampler as it was a promotional/advance tape sent around by the Italian underground label Northern Darkness Records in 1996 for free, mostly to distros, 'zines, other labels and people who ordered stuff from them. Came with a xeroxed cover and an ordinary tape with stickers on them. Scanned the cover, not the tape itself. Side A is called "...the Northern Side" and contains advance tracks, unmixed raw versions and side B is "...the Darkness Side" and has tracks from two preceeding releases, Love History MCD and Novgorod demo.

The first two tracks are sort of industrial black metal by Godfuck 93, an Italian project featuring the Necromass vocalist at the time whose name is not mentioned on the cover but I presume it'd be Charles Blasphemy. The music on these two tracks is still mostly pretty straight black metal with drum machine, samples, effects and such. Though the second track has some almost danceable beats, guess later Samael meets Aborym wouldn't be a too far-fetched comparison. I remember being quite intrigued and even excited by this back then. Entirety are also Italian and have a bit cleaner sound than Gf93... for their intro, once the metal kicks in it gets rather muddled and strangely quiet compared to the nice intro bit. Well, like the cover says material on this side of the tape is raw recordings without editing & mastering. Music is melodeath with ample background synths. Think about the Swedes in the 90's. Last on this side of the tape is Handful of Hate, Italian black metal band who are still active and released an album this year. Much clearer sound here, quite fast black metal with typically Italian occult touch and some tempo changes and atmospheric breaks, fortunately. The line-up for the album credits a J.M. for drums but this sounds like a machine here. Might be the sound. This sounds better than I remembered, I guess I have to take another listen to their albums. And that demo.

Side B opens with the intro of the only non-Italian group here, Czech Rep's Love History who play atmospheric death/doom with dramatic touches and different kinds of vocals; whispers, growls, spoken bits and so on. You're thinking My Dying Bride, aren't you? Well, fortunately they've got something of their own going there too, some slightly folksy, Slavonic-sounding (though I suppose these should be Bohemian) melodies for example which sound very nice, reminding me of Gods Tower. The cover doesn't mention their second "proper" track at all, probably due oversight. It's an instrumental piece with almost jazzy parts, showing again another side. They also sound better than I remembered, I recall preferring their country mates Dissolving of Prodigy as if I couldn't listen to both. That's a second band here I need to listen more to. Last is, wait for it, Italian Novgorod with two long tracks taken from their demo. Synth-driven gothic sort of black(ish) metal with a slightly low sound. Not very impressed with them, the songs are a bit too long for their own good and some of the transitions and playing sound very awkward and not in the good way. Annoying as there are some pretty cool moments too. The total duration of the sampler is a bit over 47 minutes and I've written enough about it, I'm hungry.

17 kommenttia:

Panacea kirjoitti...

Finally (after so many years,having read about them in some old magazine reviews and if i remember correct they compared their style with Mysticum and Diabolos Rising)i have the chance to listen to Godfuck 93.
Thanx a lot about this Velkaarn!

Panacea kirjoitti...

The funny stuff is that when i downloaded the promo and heard the Tomb Desecration XXX 192 track i remembered that i have listened to this song in a black metal compilation cd that i've got but instead of Godfuck 93 the bands name is Nazgoat.

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@Panacea:

You're welcome and Diabolos Rising is a name I should've dropped really! How did that evade me I can't fathom.

Hmm, wonder if the project was at first going to be named Nazgoat and renamed Goatfuck 93? I have the 3"MCD they released (the song titles were changed for it) and I recall there's an album released as well. Remember when the compilation was released, 1996 too?

Panacea kirjoitti...

If i remember correct the compilation must have been released in 1999 or 2000 (The cd is in a cardboard sleeve with no info at all just the bands name and the songs).There is a Nazgoat band from Italy in Metal Archives but i don't know if there is any connection between them and Goatfuck 93.

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@Panacea:

Looking at the entry for Nazgoat in M.A. I don't think it's the same band as the one on your compilation. And now I recalled and researched that Godfuck 93 changed their name to GF.93 and released four albums under this name between 1998 and 2004. The track was probably titled differently on the compilation? It was "T. 13. 11. 2 Desecration 192 Heroin" on the s/t MCD.

Does not seem very highly likely but perhaps it was a cover version by another, so far unknown Nazgoat? Or if the title was different, a blatant rip-off?

Panacea kirjoitti...

The track is exactly the same and is entitled "Tomb Desecration".Maybe it was just a mistake on the bands name ,i really do not know.Also searching the net for Nazgoat Tomb Desecration i found this video: http://youtu.be/qj-wnRy5Jsk

Anonyymi kirjoitti...

Is this it?

http://www.discogs.com/Various-Blasphemy-II-Black-Metal/release/2613999

I wonder how they could get the name so wrong if that's what happened. I'm assuming someone put the wrong line-up for the other Nazgoat there.

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@Panacea:

Yeah, definitely the same track. Oops, looking at the comments I see we've mispelled them as Goatfuck 93 on two comments, way to add to confusion. Anyways, here you can see the 3"MCD (though the contributor has managed to screw up the entry - the cover states it was recorded in 1996 not 1993!):
http://www.discogs.com/Godfuck-93-Godfuck-93-/release/2546409

And here are the albums:
http://www.discogs.com/artist/GF.93
Notably they are listed as "alternative rock" from 2000 onwards. The last one has the line-up listed for it and includes Carlo Bellotti aka Charles Blasphemy so it is the same band and not an error.

So the Nazgoat thing remains a mystery I'm afraid. Perhaps they tried switching to that for a while before deciding to go with the abbreviation of the old name or perhaps it's some sort of moronic mistake. The video is obviously based on the compilation info and made probably by the uploader.

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@anon:

Seems likely, though Panacea needs to confirm. That's completely fucked up as it lists the members of the Metal Archives listed Nazgoat on the credits... and they're the only people listed for credits!

That's a kind of strange compilation to begin with. Hard to time as the tracks cover a range of releases between 1993 (Belial) to 2000 (Carrier Flux) and most aren't even really black metal bands.

Panacea kirjoitti...

Yep thats the compilation "Black Metal Blasphemy II".So we've got two Nazgoat bands that most likely have nothing in common and for sure the compilation credits in Discogs are wrong.As you stated Velkaarn, the case with the switching name,before choosing the final GF.93, is probably the answer that we are looking for.
Godfuck 93=Indusrial Black Metal.
GF.93=Nu Metal?!?...seriously?!?

Anonyymi kirjoitti...

Well, one of the copies that is for sale on there says it's in a cardboard sleeve, like Panacea described his.

We could e-mail Carlo about it at
info at carlobellottipublishing.com

I did a lot of digging and reading of interviews and I can confirm that's one of his current e-mails. Well, it is an e-mail for his management/label thing. I wonder if he'd remember anything about it or actually tell us.

I couldn't find anything else other than GF93 was interviewed in Crash Magazine #4 in the early 2000's, which I can find no info about other than a possible connection to the founding members of Northern Tod.

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@Panacea:

Thought so, thanks for confirming it.

@anon:

You really went through a lot of trouble over this so I guess it'd be good to try send him an email. Wonder if all this speculation will amuse him enough to give an answer. I'll post a new entry and then whip up a message to him. Thanks for your work!

Anonyymi kirjoitti...

Let us know if he replies!

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

Got finally around to send him a mail. I'll certainly keep you updated if he has anything to say!

Velkaarn kirjoitti...

@all:

Ok, got a reply from Carlo:

Hi Velkaarn.
It's cool to see that peole still discuss about stuff I did when I was a kid! :)
Nazgoat do not exist and never existed, it was just a name the singer "saman" used before being in GF93, but he never released or recorded anything.
These tracks were only released on the 3" ep with Godfuck93 logo and name.
Best regards
Carlo


So that's it, the compilation had completely wrong info and the person who made the video just used that.

Anonyymi kirjoitti...

Well, another black metal mystery solved! Maybe this information will be useful to someone outside of fanatics like us one day.

Thanks for this upload, by the way!

Panacea kirjoitti...

Well, case closed! :-)
A big thanx to Velkaarn for sorting this out and to the guy for suggesting to sent (and providing) the email of Carlo Bellotti.
\m/